This invention relates to stockings with double turned-over tops or welts as produced on circular knitting machines and more particularly to stockings employing elastic yarns in their construction to make them self-sustaining. Hosiery manufactured to-day employing elastic yarn for such purpose are most men's socks, which grip the wearer above the ankle, knee-high stockings which grip the wearer above the calf, and the very popular type known as panty-hose which are held up by the elastic which circles the wearer at the waist.
Stockings, with knit-in elastic to make them self-sustaining, known as the over-the-knee type to lengths as long as those know as thigh-high have never been successfully developed as the problem encountered is that the higher on the wearer the stocking is pulled the greater the girth of the leg and the nature of the welt fabric to roll. This roll which developes as the elasticity in the stocking causes the fabric to roll unto itself as it seeks the lower areas of the leg which are of lesser girth, has only the sustaining power of a narrow garter confining all of its pressure unto a narrow band around the leg. While this pressure may be so great as to cause discomfort it is never-the-less inadequate to properly sustain the stocking.